Breastfeeding is Best for Babies

Congratulations — you’re having a baby and the big day will be here before you know it. For the past several months you’ve been consulting with your health-care professional and eating right, making sure you and baby are getting the proper nutrition for motherhood and infancy. The nursery is almost ready, you’ve decided on the right birth announcements, and your hospital bag is set to go. You may have even discussed feeding options for baby with your health-care professional, and whatever choice you make will be the right choice for you.

Breastfeeding is best for babies and the best way to feed infants—the American Academy of Pediatrics recognizes it as the gold standard in infant nutrition. In fact, the benefits of breastfeeding are indisputable.

Infant Formula is a Safe Alternative

If you choose to formula feed, keep in mind that all infant formulas marketed in the United States are subject to the exacting standards of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), pursuant to the Infant Formula Act of 1980. This legislation vested FDA with the authority to ensure that all infant formula products sold in the United States provide the necessary levels of identified nutrients required for the growth of healthy babies.

In its new 10th Edition of the Consumer Reports Best Baby Products, this foremost authority on quality and savings wrote that it saw no need for parents to choose expensive national brand infant formulas over their much more reasonable store brand counterparts sold at retailers such as Walmart, Sam’s Club, Target, CVS, Kroger, Walgreens, and Babies R Us.

"Is the store brand as good as the national brand? It has to be," writes author Sandra Gordon and the Editors of Consumer Reports.

"According to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), all formula marketed in the U.S must meet the same nutrient specifications, which are set at levels to fulfill the needs of infants. Although infant-formula manufacturers may have their own proprietary formulations, brand-name and store brand formula must contain at least the minimum levels of all nutrients specified in FDA regulations, without exceeding maximum levels, where those are specified."

Buying a heavily marketed and promoted, expensive infant formula from big pharmaceutical companies does not get your baby any closer to human breast milk than an economical store brand formula.